15 Freebie Ideas to Send to Your List (or Use as Content Upgrades)

We all know that building an email list is crucial to any business (if you don’t know that, read my post about it here!) But, once you have that list, you now have the question of what to send them.

An excellent way to build up a relationship with your subscribers is to send them freebies now and again (and use them as content upgrades for blog posts to gain new subscribers), so here are a few ideas of what you can send.

Why Send Freebies To Your List?

There are loads of reasons why you should send out freebies. In short, they help build trust, they give your subscribers a taste of what your paid products will be like (even if you don’t have any paid products yet), and they show that you care about them by giving away massive value for free. They also encourage people to sign up to your list in the first place!

There is, however, a debate on whether sending out too many freebies is the way to go – some people believe that your list could get filled with “freebie seekers” who just grab the freebies and never buy anything from you. However, I don’t look at it that way. I think most of us who have a blog have a larger purpose than just finding paying customers. We want to help people and get our message out into the world, and giving things away can help with that. The good news is that providing massive value for free does usually lead to increased business, too. So it’s a win-win situation!

By the way, freebies aren’t the only kind of content you can send your list! Click the button below to download 30 ideas for things to include in your email newsletters.

So What Can You Send?

Don’t let the fear of not knowing what to send, or not being able to create anything good enough, stop you from building your list! It just takes practice. Here are some ideas to get you started:

1) Free Weekly Newsletter: This is one of the easiest freebies you can create. Simply write an additional blog post each week, for your list subscribers’ eyes only. Sweeten it up by going deeper, being more personal, or including numbers that you’d not normally include. And make it clear that this is “insider” information to entice people to sign up.

2) Q & A: Ask your subscribers to send you questions and then answer them once a week in the form of an audio or report that only your list gets access too. One huge benefit of doing this is that you’re giving subscribers the information they ask for directly, so it’s super useful for them!

3) Tools Related to Your Niche: You can send tools that people in your niche would find useful, like free article outlines, graphics for people to use in their projects, free printables, etc. Or you could send out a list of the tools you’ve bought and use regularly. Simple, but it’s very useful and actionable.

4) Free Previews: If you already have a paid information product, why don’t you send your list a free sneak preview (like the first chapter) from that product? Make sure you follow up with a chance to buy the full version of the product.

5) A Coupon: A coupon/ discount isn’t technically free but giving a good discount to your subscribers only shows that they always get the best treatment when they’re on your list. This works best if you have a product or service-based website.

6) A Short Tips Report: If writing an entire eBook seems too much, just write a report full of short tips (this list is an example – much easier to write than a whole eBook on each topic!)

7) An Email Course: What does your target market need help with? Create an email course that teaches them one new step at a time (for example, I have a “1 Week Blog” course), over the course of 5-10 emails.

8) Free Audios: Some people prefer to listen to content on the go than read blog posts, so why not record some of your top content as audio and give away the recordings? This is a great way of repurposing your blog post contnet for people to consume in a whole new way.

9) Blog Post Bundles: Believe it or not, many people will be happy to receive a bundle of your blog posts in eBook form thanks to the convenience. There’s nothing wrong with re-using old content, getting it in front of new eyes and, most importantly, putting it in a format that’s easiest for people to take action on.

11) Interview Others: You can record an audio interview with someone else in your market, or just do it in text format if that’s more comfortable for you. Just contact friends and colleagues in your industry and let them know you’ll be promoting their site too.

12) Share Other People’s Freebies: If you don’t have a freebie yourself, there’s nothing wrong with sharing someone else’s, as long as you think it’s useful. I do this a lot! If they have an affiliate program, even better, as it means you’ll get a commission if that person then goes on to purchase a paid product from the person you shared.

13) Video Tutorials: If you’ve got some “how-to” posts on your blog, why not go one step further for your subscribers and record a video tutorial of you actually performing that task? The video will make the steps a lot easier to follow for the visual learners on your list.

15) Personal Help: Why not invite subscribers to contact you directly? Give them a round of personal email coaching, or get on the phone with them to help them with something for free. This is something that’s easier to do in the earlier stages of your list, before you get too many emails. It’s a great way to build relationships and get new ideas.